WASHINGTON—Federal agencies have been engaging in their own form of “political science,” critics say.

According to many scientists, claims of mishandling scientific research to fit policy decisions are far too common in the Bush administration. And the integrity—or accuracy and authority—of science has been jeopardized, they say.

“I think the evidence is unequivocal,” Don Buckley, a biology professor at Quinnipiac University, said. “This isn’t the only administration that has crossed the line to select evidence or to block evidence that it didn’t agree with, but no administration has been worse than this one.” 

But “the good news,” he said, “is that the 110th Congress has taken action to look at the issue.”

Research on issues such as climate change and endangered species has allegedly been compromised by political appointees with no formal scientific training. These appointees, charged with overseeing research or editing findings, have been criticized for changing field researchers’ wording or numbers to make the data consistent with policy decisions.

“Science and politics should not mix, but they have in President Bush’s administration,” Rep. Chris Murphy, D-5th District, said. “It’s a very scary prospect for scientific documents to be edited by political appointees, and that’s what’s been done.”

And two headline-grabbing cases may just be the tip of the iceberg, scientists said.

In 2005, Philip Cooney, then chief of staff for the White House Council on Environmental Quality, resigned following assertions that he edited a National Academy of Sciences report to downplay the likelihood that human activity contributes to global warming.

Cooney, a former lobbyist for the American Petroleum Institute, substituted “could” for “will” in a section detailing the drastic shifts in melting mountain glaciers and snow packs. He cut that dense section of the report down to read simply, “Warming could also lead to changes in the water cycle in polar regions.”

Cooney edited the same report to state that there are “significant remaining uncertainties associated with human-induced climate change.” Critics said the edit was an attempt to water down the links federal scientists had drawn between greenhouse gases and rising global temperatures.

Following his resignation -- a departure former White House spokesman Scott McClellan said was unrelated to the editing controversy -- Cooney took a job with Exxon Mobil Corp.

According to Kenneth Green, a scientist and resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, a conservative Washington think tank, Cooney’s “job was to be an editor for White House policy-related documents” inside the administration—not to analyze data for public consumption.

But that distinction, he acknowledged, should not have given Cooney the power to influence policy with incorrect interpretations of the findings.

“I think the optics of that whole thing were pretty bad,” he said. But “I don’t think that the Bush administration is any worse than the others.”

Buckley at Quinnipiac called Cooney’s editing inaccurate.

“The evidence is really not very equivocal,” he said of global warming. “The fact that we know so little about it, but the consequences can be so draconian … we should be wary of committing any environmental errors that could have disastrous consequences.”

Attempts to get reactions from the National Academy of Sciences and the Environmental Protection Agency were unsuccessful.

In a more recent case, Julie MacDonald, an Interior Department official, resigned last month following allegations that she’d altered scientific studies with political motives and shared internal documents with public sources.

The allegations first surfaced last spring, when the Interior Department’s inspector general received an anonymous complaint.

MacDonald, the former deputy assistant secretary for the Fish and Wildlife Service who has no formal education in natural sciences, was responsible for overseeing reviews of the application of the Endangered Species Act and Critical Habitat Designations.

A report by the inspector general said she “bullied” Fish and Wildlife field scientists into altering their findings, thereby imperiling the protections afforded by the Endangered Species Act.

In one instance, Fish and Wildlife Service Director Dale Hall said MacDonald decided to change the nesting range of the Southwest Willow Flycatcher from the 2.1 miles determined by field biologists to 1.8 miles. In the inspector general’s report, Hall—then regional director of the southwest field office—said MacDonald wanted to shrink the bird’s listed nesting range so that protected areas wouldn't extend into California, where she had worked in local governmental positions and owned a ranch with her husband.

MacDonald’s actions were not illegal—and some interviewees said her hypercritical comments were sometimes helpful—but the inspector general’s report said she had overstepped her authority.

The report also found that MacDonald had e-mailed agency documents to outside sources including lobbyists at the California Farm Bureau Federation and the Pacific Legal Foundation, a public interest group that defends property rights.

MacDonald told The Washington Post that her resignation was prompted by personal reasons.

Hugh Vickery, an Interior Department spokesman, declined to comment on MacDonald.

“We’re doing a review,” he said of the research that passed through her hands.

Vickery said the Endangered Species Act is an interpretive law, rather than a formulaic one.

“The endangered species program is not a black box,” he said. “You know, you put numbers in and you get a little ticker [tape].” Rather, it must take into account elements of both science and policy, he said.

At a House Natural Resources Committee hearing held days after MacDonald’s resignation, Francesca Grifo, a senior scientist at the Union of Concerned Scientists, a nonprofit advocacy group, testified that MacDonald’s missteps were not isolated incidents.

Grifo, who heads up the group's scientific integrity program, said the Union of Concerned Scientists surveyed federal scientists about the safety of their research and received nearly 700 responses.

In their surveys, scientists “tell of being asked to change scientific information, remove scientific facts or come to conclusions that are not supported by the science,” Grifo said.

The Union of Concerned Scientists issued a statement in 2004 expressing concern over federal misuse of science. Nearly 11,000 scientists, including Nobel laureates and former federal agency directors, have signed it, Grifo said.

Apart from raising their collective voice, scientists are seeking outside help.

Increased media attention is a good step, Grifo said, but it’s an inadequate solution on its own. Officials caught in the media spotlight have not reformed their actions, she said.

“They don’t seem to be cowed in the least,” Grifo said. “They seem more emboldened and looking for more hidden ways of doing it. They’ve just gotten more and more sneaky.”

Scientists advocate increased transparency in the federal science process, open communication between scientists and the freedom to release scientific findings, Grifo said.

On Capitol Hill, the Senate is considering legislation that would grant stronger whistleblower protections to federal employees. The House passed a similar bill, which includes a provision defining “any action that compromises the validity or accuracy of federally funded research or analysis” as an abuse of authority.

And last year, Rep. Chris Shays, R-4th District, joined three other members of Congress—including former Connecticut Republican Rep. Nancy Johnson—in drafting a letter to President Bush asking him to protect the integrity of scientific findings on climate change.

Shays and Johnson, along with Massachusetts Democratic Reps. Marty Meehan and John Olver, collected forty-one signatures from representatives on both sides of the aisle.

Green, of the conservative American Enterprise Institute, thinks legislation protecting scientific integrity is unlikely.

“I really don’t think there are any concrete institutions that can place restrictions like that” on the administration, he said.

Experts are reluctant to call for scientific academic degree requirements for political appointees in science oversight positions.

Green said the administration must determine whether nonscientists have the right to make scientific decisions.

“If they don’t,” he said, “then Al Gore has to sit down with Philip Cooney. They don’t have the credentials.”

But Green thinks intelligent people, regardless of their qualifications, can interpret the basic science well enough to come to an informed conclusion.

Buckley of Quinnipiac agrees.

“I’d be reluctant to advocate that there’d be only scientists,” he said, “but there should definitely be scientists involved in the process.”